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sure there haven’t been any concerning incidents that Empress Pernille

hasn’t shared. In the meantime it’s probably best if you don’t mention

anything about this to your family or friends. I get the impression that the

trolls would want this to be an arrangement strictly between you and them.

That . . . might be a problem, Sophie warned.

Agreed. But we’ll address that once we decide if this is even something

you should commit to.

Out loud he added, “I believe we have one more guard for you to

meet, don’t we?”

“We do,” Grady said, stomping his foot in a specific pattern against

the ground.

Sophie’s brain had just put together that he was calling the dwarf,

when the soil parted and a molelike creature with brown shaggy fur

and a pointed face poked her head out and focused on Sophie through

tightly squinted eyes.

Grady introduced them. “Sophie, meet Nubiti. You probably won’t

see her much, given her sensitivity to sunlight. But she’s only a few

stomps away if you need her.”

“We’ve developed several codes to communicate various threats,”

Sandor added. “I’ll teach you the stomping patterns later.”

Sophie nodded, turning to the dwarf, trying to think of something

better to say than “Hi.” But before she could even get that word out,

Nubiti flipped back into her hole, kicking her hairy legs and

burrowing into the earth, leaving no trace that she’d just been there.

“Bizarre creatures,” Bo murmured, raking his teeth over his lip

piercing.

“She doesn’t have much to say,” Grady explained to Sophie. “But

I’ve seen her in action on a few of my assignments with King Enki

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